Elections in Greece in October

So the waiting is over. The prime minister announced yesterday that he will call snap national elections in the coming month. Critics see this as the opposition party deciding political developments as they had threatened to oppose the re-election of the Greek President in March 2010 thus forcing elections on the country. The call for elections by ruling New Democracy is the culmination of a catastrophic chain of events for the party. It started with scandals over high level government officials being involved in bribe taking for public contracts, a minister who employed uninsured foreigners building his house, the disastrous handling of the fires around Athens two weeks ago and an overall unclear strategy of the government in the economic crisis the country is going through. Promised reforms have not been implemented and now Karamanlis will have to come up with some convincing arguments as to why
However, there seems to be a general feeling within the country of overall political stagnation. Many believe it will make no difference to them if New Democracy or PASOK wins the elections in any case. Neither party can come up with a charismatic person as a leader and there is little confidence that either of them have clear ideas on measures to counter the current economic crisis.